


that you are here, that life exists

by Thandra



Category: Fullmetal Alchemist - All Media Types
Genre: Blood and Gore, Dreams and Nightmares, Flash Fic, M/M, Nightmares, Not Really Character Death, RoyEd Month 2020, Short One Shot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-11
Updated: 2020-05-11
Packaged: 2021-03-03 06:00:23
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 752
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24130102
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Thandra/pseuds/Thandra
Summary: This is not, shouldn’t be his nightmare - he sees a basement, two boys kneeling on the floor, a familiar armor in the corner of the room. The boys nod at each other, and touch the circle - and suddenly Roy understands why this is his nightmare.Day 9: Eradicate - this became a Nightmare Flashfic actually.
Relationships: Alphonse Elric & Edward Elric, Edward Elric/Roy Mustang
Comments: 6
Kudos: 48
Collections: RoyEd month





	that you are here, that life exists

**Author's Note:**

> Hi People! This little thing came as a surprise for me too, I usually take way more time to write; but this is the second fic I publish for RoyEd Month, and I almost can’t believe it! This is short, and kind of sad, and still not beta read - hope you’ll enjoy it anyway! Let me know!

Roy knows immediately that he’s dreaming - he always knows: in all his dreams, all his nightmares, he can always tell they’re not real; but that doesn’t make them less scary. 

This nightmare is weird, though. There’s no sand, for once; no soldiers, no smoke, no unmistakable smell of burning flash. No empty, red eyes and not even enough fire to light a candle - surely unusual, but not at all less scary. 

  
  
  


_ He dreams of a little village in the east, of a homey house full of books, with a kind woman and two little children - this is not my nightmare, is his first thought. The mother dies, and the boys turn to alchemy for answers: they try to bring her back. _

_ This is not, shouldn’t be his nightmare - he sees a basement, two boys kneeling on the floor, a familiar armor in the corner of the room. Roy can’t breath, he doesn’t want to witness this.  _

_ The boys nod at each other, and touch the circle - and suddenly Roy understands why this is his nightmare.  _

_ Alphonse Elric is on the floor, in a pool of blood, crying desperately and shouting his brother’s name. Besides him, there’s a corpse. A corpse with no arms and no legs, bleeding profusely - disappearing slowly.  _

_ Alphonse screams get higher and more desperate, the panic in his voice breaks Roy’s heart. The corpse dissolves slowly, until there’s nothing under the neck anymore - golden hair and gold, empty eyes. Edward disappears, Alphonse screams.  _

  
  
  


Roy wakes up screaming, on the verge of a heart attack - he’s cold, and sweaty, and feels one step from delirious. He gets up, and all he can hear are his own pants, all he can see is - 

“Hello?” _ oh, right _ . He called someone, with the phone. “Rockbells’ Mechanics, can I help you? Is this an emergency?”

_ Alphonse _ , It’s Alphonse. The kind, young man that smiles at everyone and loves apple pie. The happy one, the grown up one - not the boy screaming his brother’s name as he disappears, tears mixing with blood under his knees. 

“Alphonse” he rasps out, but he can’t say more - his hands are shaking, his breath is getting more and more labored: _ panic attack, it’s a panic attack.  _ “Colo- General Mustang! Did something happen? Is everything okay?” Roy will feel guilty about calling in the middle of the night, alearting an entire house on the other side of the country - as soon as he gets his body, and mind, under control, that is. 

“Edward” he whispers, and those letters taste like ashes in his mouth. “Fullmetal” he says, and it smells like blood and sounds like a cry. A prayer. “I’ll call him” Alphonse answers, and Mustang is glad he doesn’t say more: his voice,  _ that voice _ , even if it’s the grown up version, echoes in screams still. And Roy can’t, he can’t - 

“Bastard? What the fuck are you calling for, in the middle of the night?” Roy’s knees buckle, he hits the floor - they’ll hurt tomorrow, when he’ll feel the blood flowing again - It’s  _ Edward. It’s Edward’s voice. Edward.  _ “Mustang? Are you okay?  _ Roy?” -  _ Roy trembles, breaths, cries. 

“Edward” he says, voice barely above a whisper, shaking more than his hands “Fullmetal”

And this time it’s a prayer, a cry of joy - pure relief fills his lungs with air, the ground and his body stop shaking, pure unaltered joy blinks his tears away. 

“Ed” he cries again, in a gaspy laugh -  _ he’s alive. Edward Elric is alive, and Roy met him.  _ Roy saw him grow up, and learn, and cry, and laugh, and fight, and loose, and  _ win _ .  _ He didn’t die in that basement, before Roy could even meet him; his existence wasn’t eradicated before Roy could do anything about it -  _ Roy met him and, for that alone, he is the luckiest bastard that ever lived. 

“ _ I love you”  _ he whispers on the phone, just before hanging up - he has no idea why he did that, why he felt the sudden compulsion to confess  _ that.  _ Tomorrow, he’ll have to deal with the fall out: the confusion, obviously; most likely the anger, and then the inevitable rejection. He hopes Edward will still want him around, at least as a friend - he hopes. 

He hopes, but it won’t matter if it doesn’t happen -  _ because Ed is alive.  _ He can go to sleep, and wake up, and keep breathing; because Edward Elric is alive, and Roy met him and Roy loves him.  _ And that’s enough, it’s more than he could have dreamed of.  _


End file.
